


trust fall

by gortysproject



Category: Wolf 359 (Radio)
Genre: Deceit, F/F, First Kiss, Happy Endings Whomst? Don't Know Her, Implied Sexual Content, Mutual Pining (But Not Like You've Seen It Before), Trust No One Not Even Your Potential Girlfriend, WOW that looks like a clickbait
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-07-23
Packaged: 2018-12-05 21:51:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11586900
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gortysproject/pseuds/gortysproject
Summary: Lovelace gets to figure out whether surviving Maxwell and kissing Maxwell are mutually exclusive events or not. Maxwell gets to experience some firsts. Hera gets to judge them both.Plus, a good side buried really, really,reallydeep down, kicking the entirety of the SI5 out of an airlock, never being interested in talking about Jacobi, and inspiring a sci-fi novel or five.





	trust fall

**Author's Note:**

> i've been wanting to write something for lovelace/maxwell for Ages not because these two are uhhhh my guilty pleasure honestly. hope you enjoy ,

“ _Kepler isn’t going to budge. We know there’s no point trying to make friends with him. Obey him, but we’re never gonna catch him off his guard. Jacobi and Maxwell are our best bets – sure, they’re probably equally terrible people, but they aren’t as calculating as him. We need to make friends with them. We need to get close to them. And then we need to pray like hell that there’s a good side buried really, really,_ really _deep down inside them._ ”

Lovelace’s own words echo in her mind, and she pretends she can’t hear them.

“ _We need to make friends with them. We need to get close to them_.”

Minkowski had nodded solemnly. Eiffel had glanced away uncomfortably, muttering _yeah, sure_ to nobody in particular. Lovelace had wished she didn’t have to ask these things of them. Lovelace had wished she could kick the entirety of the SI5 out of an airlock and take the Urania for the Hephaestus crew.

Hilbert had tried to say something, and Lovelace had ignored him.

Hera had argued that it wasn’t _deceit_ – Maxwell (and Jacobi, probably, but Hera was never interested in talking about Jacobi, and none of them could be bothered to pretend she was) could be good, could leave Kepler behind, could have a change of heart _. She’s not a bad person_ , Hera had insisted, glitching over the words as though she were choked up on her own emotions. _Maybe we should give her a chance_.

Now, Lovelace closes her eyes against the memory, trying and failing to decide whether it would be worse for Hera to be wrong or right.

She’s a military girl. Stealth, where she comes from, is about flying at night when no one can shoot you down, about pulling the trigger before your target turns around. Stealth isn’t words and laughter and sharing a coffee through a long, dull shift, to the point where any company is good company.

Maybe there are some similarities. Maybe hitting hour five, equating to two in the morning, can allow Lovelace to fly through the night on this mission. Maybe choosing the right moment, stealing the element of surprise, will allow her to pull a different trigger.

Maybe Dr Maxwell – energetic, enthusiastic, beautiful Dr Maxwell – can glance at her in the pale blue light reflecting off the star, in hour five of a dull shift, her untied hair floating around her face in a halo and her eyes bright with a sparkle Lovelace hasn’t bore witness to in a long, long time. Maybe the urge can rise up through her to kiss this woman.

Maybe she doesn’t ignore it.

The conversation was on mechanics – Maxwell explaining the Urania’s engine, and how it had only taken three months to travel eight light years ( _I know, we’re gonna inspire a sci-fi novel or five_ ). Lovelace was comparing it to her own shuttle’s engine, and her own prediction that her journey would have taken, at the very least, twice as long – _seven months, probably_ was her guess.

But then the words stopped flowing, and Maxwell’s hands faltered in the air from where she’d been excitedly reeling off the stats surrounding the VX5, and then…

Then Lovelace leaned forward, hand against the console, and kissed her.

Which is where she is, now. Eyes closed, lips pressed against Maxwell’s, fighting the tide of guilt that threatens to overwhelm her when all her mind can do is flit back to that midnight meeting in the secret room and Hera’s voice, desperate to believe herself, insisting, _she’s not a bad person_.

All of this happens in a heartbeat.

Lovelace pulls away as though she’s been shocked. Her eyes open, wide, wider still, and she stares at Maxwell in the dimly-lit room, mouth opening to say words that don’t yet exist _. This is salvageable,_ she thinks _. Just apologise and move on_. Maxwell is staring back at her, lips parted, cheeks slightly pinker than they were before. It’s a terribly distracting sight, but nonetheless, Lovelace prepares to say something eloquent.

“Shit,” she manages, and decides it was a good attempt.

“Noooo,” Maxwell backtracks immediately, hands lifting into a surrender position. “No shit. It was – that’s – you’re fine. That was fine.”

Lovelace blinks. “Okay,” she says, slowly, pretending her heart isn’t thudding at something close to three hundred beats per minute and threatening to send her into cardiac arrest. Carefully, she adds, “No shitting. Got it.”

Something hisses behind them as the station creaks and readjusts itself, and Lovelace briefly wonders if that was Hera’s way of laughing at her.

A moment passes in awkward silence, and then another, and then Lovelace delicately continues with, “So, uh, you were saying about the VX5?”

There’s a pause.

Maxwell starts giggling.

“ _Smooth_ ,” she appraises, mockingly, and Lovelace hits her arm in something between annoyance and fake-annoyance as she turns back to the window. Maxwell is grinning at her. “No, really, you know how to keep someone on their toes.”

“Cute,” Lovelace replies drily, “but you don’t _need_ to go on your toes to reach me when we’re in zero-gravity, shorty.”

Maxwell gasps. “I’m not short,” she insists. “I’m – you’re just _tall_.”

“I’m, what, five-seven? Five-eight?” Lovelace scoffs. “That’s not tall. Though, that was when I was last on Earth. Would six years in space do anything to your height?”

She glances at Maxwell, but Maxwell doesn’t answer. She’s too busy staring out the window – thinking? Calculating? Avoiding? Lovelace can’t tell. But there is a loud, undeniable change in the atmosphere of the room, and she isn’t entirely sure what to do with it.

Apparently, the answer is nothing, because Maxwell breaks the silence a moment later. “You could, uh. If you want. You could do it again.” She doesn’t look at her.

_Oh_. Lovelace hesitates, before replying, “Right – I didn’t… get your permission before. Sorry about that.”

“But you have it now,” Maxwell says, and her gaze finally slides back to where Lovelace is floating beside her. “So, Captain, what’re you gonna do with it?”

Lovelace can’t be certain, but she believes there is every chance that it would be _criminal_ not to take the opportunity being offered to her. She leans in. Softer, calmer than before, she presses her lips to Maxwell’s.

Maxwell responds tentatively, at first. Fingers encircle Lovelace’s wrist, likely to keep the two of them from drifting apart (because kissing in space is _difficult_ , apparently) and her eyelids drop closed in a moment of vulnerability. She’s a clumsy kisser, Lovelace notices, or maybe just an inexperienced one, but it’s definitely nothing to complain about; Lovelace takes the lead, guiding Maxwell through the motions.

Her tongue swipes against Maxwell’s lower lip, seeking permission. When Maxwell’s lips automatically part and Lovelace’s tongue takes advantage, Maxwell makes a noise unlike anything Lovelace has ever heard from her – a sound, not quite desire, not quite desperation, but something _thrilled_ nonetheless. Immediately, the fingers round her wrist disappear, and Lovelace instead feels fingers combing through her thick hair, gripping tightly.

The movement makes her grin, and she pulls away, face pressing instead into Maxwell’s neck as they tug each other closer. Maxwell makes another, similar noise when the curving lips of Lovelace’s grin instead start to kiss a trail down her throat, and Lovelace considers it a personal victory to unlock such a private sound from her.

“H-how much,” Maxwell starts, trying to steady her voice, “of this shift is, um, left?”

Lovelace glances to the clock, and chuckles lowly as she pulls away from Maxwell’s tight grasp. “Thirty-five minutes,” she replies. “But it’s a pretty long journey down to the Urania from here, right? And my quarters are only a few doors down.”

Maxwell blinks at her, so she clarifies, “The offer’s there, if you want it.”

“Shit,” Maxwell mutters.

“No shit,” Lovelace echoes from their previous conversation. “It’s a yes-or-no question.”

Unhesitating, Maxwell says, “ _Yes_. Okay. Yes.”

Lovelace’s hands push through her own hair to undo the damage Maxwell’s grip did to the style. “Real question is,” she says, lips curving around another grin, “can you wait thirty-five minutes, Doctor?”

 

* * *

 

Maxwell has never been particularly interested in sex. She’s never been particularly interested in romance, either. To have her first kiss (among many, _many_ other firsts, it would appear) in the hands of her enemy, eight light years from home, could have easily overwhelmed her. And it does. She’s rarely been happier to be overwhelmed before in her life.

The happiness dissipates the next morning (where she left Captain Lovelace’s quarters, not her own, in yesterday’s clothes and a scent that isn’t her own and the faint imprint of the bed’s straps around her waist, where it had housed not one but _two_ people that night) and a hand lands on her shoulder from behind – _close, too close_. She turns around to see Kepler, who beckons her silently to follow him to the Urania.

Safely inside his quarters, a chilling silence hangs in the air, before Kepler says, “Report?”

“I… did as you asked,” Maxwell replies honestly. “She trusts me. I’m sure of it.”

“And you spent the night together,” Kepler comments lightly, moving to his desk as though this were simply another business meeting. It hits Maxwell, then, that this is _exactly_ what it is to him.

She feels uncomfortable. She answers him anyway. “Yeah. For added effect.”

“Interesting method of choice.” Nothing sits behind those words – no deeper meaning, no emphasis, no hidden warning. It is a pure observation, and the simplicity of it makes Maxwell’s skin crawl.

After a moment, he nods. “Dismissed,” he tells her, but something seems off in his tone. Just as Maxwell turns to the door, ready to leave him, he adds, “Oh, Alana?”

She turns back to face him. “Sir?”

“Don’t get attached.”

The words sink heavily in her gut. “Of course not, sir.”

**Author's Note:**

> as always, i'm @aihera on tumblr if you want to yell at me about how much kepler sucks or how great lovelace and maxwell would be as a couple


End file.
